


Belongings and Belonging

by frogy



Category: You Could Make a Life Series - Taylor Fitzpatrick
Genre: BDSM, Collars, Edging, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-19
Updated: 2019-12-19
Packaged: 2021-02-24 16:27:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21860923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frogy/pseuds/frogy
Summary: When Jared ships yet another final box of gift-wrapped boxes to Bryce, it's time to admit Bryce's habit of shopping his feelings has rubbed off on Jared.Plus, a gift you're not sure the other person is going to like barely counts as a gift.(Spoiler alert: Bryce likes it.)
Relationships: Bryce Marcus/Jared Matheson
Comments: 8
Kudos: 42





	Belongings and Belonging

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DizzyRedhead](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DizzyRedhead/gifts).



> Coming up with titles is the worst.
> 
> Takes place at some point in the future where neither of them play for their current teams.

A mountain of gifts is usually Bryce's thing, but well, they couldn't make the flights work to be in the same place at the same time this Christmas so Jared may be overcompensating. When Jared ships yet another final box of gift-wrapped boxes to Bryce, it's time to admit Bryce's habit of shopping his feelings has rubbed off on Jared. 

Plus, a gift you're not sure the other person is going to like barely counts as a gift. Jared has to send other things too, real gifts, an original animation cell of Pooh and Eeyore and cashmere socks he can steal back later and some home-cooked meals for Bryce packaged in dry ice with the instructions to open immediately, and wasn't it an adventure to mail those, plus his gifts for Elaine who has all the time in the world to fly out for Christmas with Bryce and of whom Jared is definitely not jealous. Definitely not. 

It's just that he saw the black leather collar, with heavy silver hardware where it buckles in the back and matching D-ring hanging in the front. And when he asked the salesperson if he could see it and they took it out of the case, the leather was smooth and soft, the whole thing weightier and more substantial in his hands than he thought it would be. The inside was lined with something almost furry, decadent and soft. Jared thought about how Bryce falls apart in handcuffs, even when they're not cuffed to anything, just straps of leather that Jared's wrapped around Bryce's wrists, and thought maybe.

The Mathesons have descended on Jared's apartment, his dad taking over Christmas morning breakfast cooking after a token protest that Jared can cook. That's fine, Jared was mostly in the kitchen to get a coffee before Erin gets up and they have to do presents. Not needing to cook leaves Jared free to duck back into his bedroom with his coffee and call Bryce.

"Think about it," Bryce says answering the phone.

"Merry Christmas to you too," Jared says. And then, "you weren't supposed to open that one this morning," because me stuck a note on the outside of the gift-wrapped box that said as much, and a note inside the wrapping paper that Bryce is quoting back to him. "Did you like it?"

"I've been thinking about it non-stop for days," Bryce whines. 

"You had a game," Jared says and, like, it certainly didn't look like Bryce was distracted from the highlights Jared caught when he got home from his own game. 

Bryce must have opened it as soon as it arrived, package tracking had it arriving the same day as Elaine flew in to catch Bryce's last game before the holiday on the opposite coast from where Jared was doing the same thing. They had talked that morning, and Bryce hasn't mentioned anything. He must have opened it after morning practice, or maybe after his nap, piling the other presents under the tree, unwrapping this one the last thing he does before running out the door to the arena.

"It was hard," Bryce says. 

Jared smirks unseen at his end of the call at the whine in Bryce's voice. "How hard was it?"

"Jared," Bryce whines, "not with my mom here."

"Fine, fine," Jared says. "Is she there in the room? Say hello for me."

She's not, they've already done Christmas breakfast and opening presents under the tree in their matching pajamas several time-zones ahead of the Mathesons, and are getting dressed to go wandering for the day. Jared stays on the phone talking to Bryce until the rest of the Mathesons are awake and Jared has to go do Christmas morning with them.

He guesses that answers the question of whether Bryce liked that present.

\---

The circumstances aren't ideal, but Jared is happy to have Bryce home for All Star break. It would have been better if he were home without having missed the last two games because of his shoulder acting up. But Bryce swears he's fine, he'll be back in the line up after the break, and really, he's fine. It's not until Bryce says that if he were still with the Flames he wouldn't have been out at all, that Jared finally stops fussing. Jared's younger self would be horrified, but he is so happy Bryce isn't on the Flames anymore. No matter how much harder it makes it for them, Bryce is in such a better situation now.

They fall asleep on the couch, the latest interchangeable Marvel movie on in the background, Bryce sprawled on top of Jared, a warm, heavy, rhythmically breathing weight that lulls Jared into following Bryce into a nap.

When they wake up it's dark out, but in January that could mean it's anywhere from mid-afternoon to the middle of the night. Bryce's face is nestled in Jared's chest. They haven't left the apartment yet today, and Jared would be okay if they don't manage to at all, but he's not sure what Bryce wants. "You wanna get up and get dressed to go out for dinner?" he asks. "Or should we order in?"

"What time is it? I'm not hungry yet."

Jared looks over to the cable box which is glowing the time in the pitch-black room. "It's still early, 5-ish," Jared tells him.

"Can I pick something out?" Bryce asks. "And we can order something later." 

"Yeah," That works for Jared. Except, "nothing that will mess with your shoulder."

"Okay," Bryce says, pushing himself up and off of Jared and the couch. Jared is suddenly cold without Bryce blanketing him. He sits up and waits, giving Bryce a few minutes head start to figure out what he wants. 

Jared always lets Bryce choose when they play. Bryce is reluctant to talk about it when they're not in the heat of the moment. Not that Jared hasn't forced him to talk about it when it feels necessary. But he doesn't want to force more uncomfortable conversations than necessary. And Bryce goes quiet, out of it, when they are in the middle of it. So this is Jared's way of making sure Bryce is getting what he wants out of it. Jared is really into Bryce being really into it. So he waits.

When it feels like it's been long enough, Jared gets up and goes to their bedroom. Bryce is sitting at the end of their bed, the box with the collar in it open on his lap. Jared walks over so he's standing in front of Bryce. He runs his hands through Bryce's hair, leaning down to place a kiss on the top of Bryce's head.

"Good choice," Jared says, taking the box off Bryce's lap and deposits it on the bed next to him. "Get naked and sit back down."

There are a few more things Jared needs. First, the chair in the corner of their bedroom that mostly serves as a place for Bryce to pile clothing. Jared picks up the current pile and sets it down carefully on the floor. Bryce makes a "hey" of protest that has Jared shooting a quelling look back at him. Jared drags the chair over to the end of the bed, leaving it in front of where Bryce is sitting. Next, he grabs the lube from their bedside table, bringing it to where he's setting up at the end of the bed. 

Bryce is sitting back where he was before, naked now when he looks up at Jared standing in front of him. Jared picks up the box with the collar. "I guess you like it?"

Bryce doesn't answer right away, but he's not hiding anything from Jared, who can see the flush rising on Bryce's cheeks, the way his eyes dilate as Jared runs is hands around the loop of the collar before taking it gently out of the box and putting the box down. Bryce is half-hard as Jared unbuckles the collar. It slides open easily, the leather supple and the hardware heavy and high quality. "So you like it?" Jared prompts again.

"Yeah," Bryce finally gets out.

"Have you tried it on?" Jared asks. "Put it on wishing I were here?" He knows he's pushing, but he wants to know. Bryce closes his eyes, like if he can't see Jared he can stop his questions. 

When that doesn't stop Jared's prompting Bryce leans forward burying his face against Jared's stomach. Jared's hands automatically come up to cradle Bryce's head there. "No," Bryce finally chokes out. "I- only you."

"Only me," Jared echoes, tipping Bryce's head back. He runs his hand around the bare skin of Bryce's neck before wrapping the leather of the collar around him, buckling it closed. Jared repeats the motion, running his fingers along Bryce's neck in the space between his skin and the collar, testing the fit, making sure it's not too tight. When he's satisfied that it's good, he repeats the motion a third time, running his hand along the outside of the collar, pressing harder to make sure Bryce can feel his caress through the leather. 

"Lie back," Jared tells Bryce, pushing gently at his shoulder. Bryce goes easily, laying flat on their bed, with his legs hanging off the end bent at the knees. "Good," Jared says. 

Jared sits down in the chair he's brought over. "Open up," he says, but he already has his hands on Bryce, moving him where he wants him, pushing his legs apart so he can scoot the chair closer to the bed between Bryce's legs. "Stay just like that," Jared says running his hands along the inside of Bryce's thighs. "Look at you," Jared says because Bryce is beautiful laid out on display like this.

Jared lets go of Bryce just long enough to grab the lube and squeeze some into his hand, before getting that hand around Bryce's dick. Bryce is already so hard, just from the buildup, from wearing Jared's collar. He could make Bryce come so easily like this, but he doesn't want to. Jared keeps his hand loose, a little too slick and a little too slow, as he strokes Bryce. "Tell me when you're going to come."

Bryce whines his name, which Jared takes for agreement. 

"You look so good like this, so beautiful." Jared says. Jared can be an asshole in regular life, but when Bryce is like this, open and vulnerable, he can only respond in kind. "You're so good for me, so hot," Jared tells Bryce, keeping up a steady stream of praise with his steady strokes on his cock.

Even trying to drag it out, Jared's hand and his words and his collar around have Bryce on edge too soon. The muscles in Bryce's thighs tremble with the effort to hold still, to hold back, until he can't and his groans become words. "Jared, please, I'm gonna," and it's then, at the last second, Jared lets go. 

Bryce lets out an unconscious whine, and Jared shushes him, hands firm and steady on Bryce's legs, both calming and a tease at once.

When Bryce's breathing has settled back into heavy steady breaths, his muscles no longer twitching on a hair's trigger, Jared re-slicks his hand with more lube, and gets his hand back around Bryce's dick. Jared starts with the same easy strokes as before, but he changes it up this time, stopping on the upstroke to play at the head of Bryce's dick, rubbing his thumb over the slit with his thumb, twisting on the downstroke to tease at Bryce's frenulum just the way Bryce likes. Up, swipe, twist, down, and repeat.

Bryce gets to the edge a lot faster this time, his mumbled "I'm gonna-" barely out before Jared pulls away. Jared leans in closer to run his hands along Bryce's sides, feeling his panting, shaking breaths in the sweat-damp flank of his core. Jared holds on tight, as much to steady Bryce as it is to keep from reaching for his own dick, achingly hard from how hot Bryce is, how good he's being for Jared. Jared lets all of that spill out, running his mouth with how good and hot and beautiful and _his_ Bryce is being, until they've both calmed down enough to keep going.

Jared resumes stroking Bryce's dick with his re-slicked hand, this time joining in with his other hand which had been acting as a steadying pressure on Bryce's hip, now fondling his balls.

Bryce lets out a keening whine, and Jared looks up from his ministrations to take in the rest of Bryce. Jared didn't necessarily mean for his earlier 'stay there' to be taken as a command, but Bryce is following it to the letter. His head is thrown back, but he's lying as flat and still as if Jared had him lashed to the bed with restraints, but it's nothing but the collar and Jared's words holding him in place. Jared runs a knuckle down behind Bryce's balls, massaging at Bryce's perineum. Bryce's balls pull in tight and heavy, ready to come, and his whole body seems to vibrate with the effort it takes to stay still, but he does it, his hands curling into fists with the effort it takes not to move more than that.

And despite Bryce's silence, Jared lets go again. 

"What, you weren't going to say anything that time?" Jared asks.

"Jared," Bryce whines. Jared's not sure if it's an attempt to answer his question or a desperate plea to put his hands back on Bryce.

"You thought I'd just let you come? You think I don't know what you look like when you're close?"

"No, no, sorry, I'm sorry," Bryce babbles, desperate and contrite.

"Hey, no, it's okay," Jared says taking Bryce's left hand, the one with his wedding ring, and uncurls Bryce's fingers from the fist they're making, digging his thumbs into the meat of his hand, massaging the tension out of Bryce's hand. "You're doing so good," he says. Jared kisses Bryce's palm before he lays his hand down again. 

Jared picks up Bryce's right hand, which has relaxed out of a fist on its own. Jared still takes the time to uncurl Bryce's fingers, giving it the same treatment as his left, before laying that one down flat too. 

Bryce's isn't carrying the tension in his hands anymore, but the rest of him is still taut, ready to come. He reminds Bryce "don't come," before getting back to it. 

He pours more lube straight on Bryce's dick this time, even though Bryce is dripping with pre-come, lets him shiver from the wet cold slide of it before wrapping his hand around him. Bryce is so hard and hot in Jared's hand, his dick so red he's practically purple, he's so close. Jared barely counts this as jerking Bryce off anymore, giving Bryce one, two, three strokes before letting go for longer than he was touching him, so that Bryce can't come, then doing it again, and again and again. There's no calming Bryce down between stroking anymore, just holding off the inevitable, holding Bryce's hips down against the bed even as his back arches in desperation.

Jared leans forward, blowing a stream of cold air against the head and Bryce's dick twitches and bobs like it's straining for Jared's mouth but Bryce is too sloppy wet from lube for Jared to want to blow him. He wraps a steady, possessive hand around Bryce to keep him still as he does it again. And that's the crux of it. "You're mine, all of you, mine, forever." 

Bryce responds with a high-pitched, hiccuping keening and full body tremble. Jared looks up, and Bryce's face is as wet as his crotch, eyes squeezed shut against the on-stream of tears. And, "oh," suddenly he's too far away even with both hands touching Bryce, so he scrambles up on the bed pressing himself along Bryce's side. "Bryce, love," Jared says, pressing his palm flat to Bryce's chest where his heart is pounding hard in his ribs. "What do you need?" Bryce is too far gone to answer. He just turns his face into Jared's shoulder pushing in close, panting wet and hot into the crook of Jared's neck. "You can come, whatever you need, I love you so much," and Jared's not even done getting that out before Bryce is tensing against him and coming, spurting all over his own stomach.

Jared goes quiet after Bryce comes, letting Bryce come down in his own time. Bryce's full body trembling calms into slight tremors until eventually into slow, even breathing. Jared wouldn't be surprised if Bryce relaxed right into sleep, but when Jared ventures a quiet "are you okay now?" Bryce squirms against him, rubbing pointedly at where Jared is still painfully hard against Bryce's side. It's not that Jared forgot exactly, but that in the balance of things, the weight of his responsibility for Bryce when they do things like this is so much heavier than Jared's own orgasm. 

But Bryce has his own sense of fairness that insists Jared get off too. It's not going to take much for Jared to come, he's been close for as long as Bryce has been. It's not until Bryce brings a hand up to paw at Jared's waist that Jared realizes he's still got his clothes on. 

It's easy to push his sweats down and get his dick out. Bryce gets his hand under Jared's t-shirt, settling on the small of his back, encouraging Jared to rub against him.

Bryce turns his head to meet Jared's, and they're kissing, open-mouthed and sloppy, as wet and messy as the rest of them. Jared grinds against Bryce's hip, until he comes, shivery against Bryce's side.

Jared lets them lie there just long enough to catch his breath, before he says "come on, shower."

But Bryce has already fallen asleep, or is pretending well enough that Jared's not moving him. If he's quick enough, Bryce will just go with him if Jared shuffles him along to the shower, but Jared missed his window, so he's left to clean them off while Bryce passively resists moving.

Jared goes to unbuckle the collar, but Bryce, actively resisting, mumbles "no," and rolls away from Jared's ministrations. And that answers whether he was just pretending to be asleep or not.

Jared sighs, but leaves it climbing back into bed. Bryce rolls back toward him, wrapping Jared arms around him. And it's easy to fall asleep in his arms.

\---

"What time is it?" Jared asks, blinking awake.

"Almost ten," Bryce says. He's sitting up in bed next to Jared, the room dark except for Bryce's face, lit up by whatever he's doing on his phone. Bryce is still wearing the collar. 

"You good?" Jared asks, sitting up and scoots over so he's leaning against the headboard next to Bryce.

"Yeah," Bryce says. "I ordered pizza."

"Good." Now that Bryce said it, Jared realizes he's starving, but not it's not what Jared meant. "I meant the collar and the edging though?" Jared's prepared to push, because Bryce may not like talking about it, but Jared needs to know. Bryce seems fine, totally back to normal, but that was a lot. And he doesn't want to make Bryce cry like that by accident, never wants to hurt him, unless those were good tears and Bryce wants it. But how is he supposed to know if Bryce won't tell him.

At first, Jared thinks he's going to need to push. Bryce puts his phone down, letting the room return to darkness. "Too much?" Jared prompts.

Bryce finds Jared's hand in the dark, slotting their fingers together. "It was good. I like the collar. I like being yours."

"Oh."

"Come on, you know that," Bryce says, squeezing Jared's hand.

"Yeah." Jared squeezes back. He does know that. 

It sounds shallow even in his own thoughts that he was mostly thinking how it would be hot. He wasn't thinking about how Bryce likes the visible signs of their relationship. He wasn't thinking about how it was Bryce's idea they wear their wedding rings. He wasn't thinking about how Bryce always wears the sweaters Jared buys him for Christmas. And yeah, Jared wears all the clothing Bryce buys for him but that's because Bryce is good at fashion and shit. Jared is not. Bryce wears those sweaters 100% because Jared bought them and that means something. But Jared wasn't thinking anything about that. He should have been.

"Yeah," Jared says. "I like you being mine too."

**Author's Note:**

> Hi DizzyRedHead! Happy YCMAL holiday fic exchange! This was a delight to write. I hope you enjoyed it!


End file.
